


The Gift

by AndroidPalindrome



Series: Frisking in Time and Space [1]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Adult Frisk, Alphys and Gaster are both Royal Scientists, Ambassador Frisk, And Frisk can travel to different universes/timelines, Asriel lives in Frisk's body, Dad W. D. Gaster, Frisk was adopted by Toriel and Asgore, Frisk's Pronouns are They/Them, Gaster Blasters, Gaster was recently rescued from the Void, Good W. D. Gaster, If anyone suggests Frisk and Sans are a couple I will punch them in the face, In Medias Res, In which Frisk gets Gaster Blasters after seven years, In which the Monster kingdom still exists on the surface, Mentions of events on the associated RP blog, Nonbinary Character, Nonbinary Frisk, Platonic Relationships, Platonic Soulmates, Post-Pacifist Route, Queerplatonic Sans/Frisk - Freeform, Undertale Spoilers, Worldbuilding, headcanons
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-25
Updated: 2016-03-25
Packaged: 2018-05-29 02:44:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6355717
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AndroidPalindrome/pseuds/AndroidPalindrome
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Frisk was called to the Royal Laboratory for a 'surprise', they had no idea that a dream they'd had since meeting the skeleton family was about to come true.</p><p>In which Frisk gets Gaster Blasters, worries about their potential for LOVE, and has an amazing family.</p><p>(associated with the the Tumblr RP blog <a href="http://frisking-in-time-and-space.tumblr.com">'Frisking in Time and Space'</a>, see inside for details)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Gift

**Author's Note:**

> This work is a companion piece for my RP blog ['Frisking in Time and Space'](http://frisking-in-time-and-space.tumblr.com). 
> 
> The basic nitty-gritty of this 'verse is that it takes place seven years after the Monsters escape the Underground. Frisk was adopted by Toriel and Asgore and became the heir to the throne and ambassador to humanity, they were never possessed by Chara, they share their body with Asriel (for reasons), and the atrocities of the neutral and genocide runs were committed by their twin brother, Tera, who fell first. Frisk is now nineteen and can jump to different timelines in the Undertale multiverse. They're also kind of a magical "girl", but that's a whole other story.
> 
> Even if you don't know what's going on, I hope you find some enjoyment from this anyways!

When Frisk keyed into the private lounge of the Royal Laboratory, they were surprised to discover that Gaster, Sans, and Alphys were already there. Since Gaster’s return from the Void several months ago, the capacity of Royal Laboratory’s research and development department had almost tripled with the inclusion of theoretical physics, time mechanics, and (extremely restricted) Determination research into the normal roster of magitech engineering, software and computer development, and geothermal engineering. While all three scientists were still buzzing in excitement over the lab’s broadened horizons, more projects meant more lab technicians, scientists, researchers, and engineers on the payroll, and with more experiments to run and workers to supervise, the trio found themselves working longer and more awkward hours than before. It was satisfying work, yes, but also physically and mentally exhausting.

 

Yet despite the lab’s swollen workload and the fact that the ambassador had arrived half an hour early (having planed on reading in the lounge and relaxing), Gaster, Sans, and Alphys seemed to have long settled on the large, circular couch in the center of the room, clad in white coats, sipping coffee, and chatting amicably. Well, not quite chatting; said conversation seemed to consist of Alphys ranting about the unnecessary fanservice in the latest episode of a magical girl anime, Gaster listening politely with his hands folded in his lap, and Sans making some sort postmodern tower out of Alphys’ spare Pokemon cards. At the sound of Frisk entering, all three heads snapped up, and beaming, bright smiles replaced any previous emotion on their faces.

 

 **“ Ah, you’re here early, my dear!”** Gaster was the first to speak, chuckling and shaking his head at the flabbergasted look on the human’s face. **“ Ah, yes, we’re all dreadfully early, I know, but you can’t blame us for being too excited to concentrate on work.”**

 

“ Damn, whatever you all have to show me must be pretty impressive.” Frisk finally registered the small gift box on the center coffee table—wrapped in pastel-colored parchment and tied with an iridescent ribbon—and whistled in appreciation. “ If the outside looks this pretty, I can’t imagine what’s inside.”

 

“ * heh, i know it’s not the biggest box in the world, but lemme tell you—this is a small package with a biiiiiiiiig punch.” Sans was practically radiating excitement, and his bright-‘eyed’, giddy-grinned happiness was still foreign enough to make a well of tenderness pool at the base of Frisk’s throat. Unable to help themself, they bent over and bonked the skeleton fondly on the forehead, making his cheekbones turn a fetching shade of blue. “ *ah, geeze, kid, if you’re already that happy about the box, i can’t wait to see how you’re gonna react when you actually open it.”

 

Alphys had a good snicker at Sans’ bashfulness before getting to her feet and padding over to Frisk. “ We’re all p-pretty excited, really. We’ve been working on this s-since Dr. Gaster came back to work. I-it’s something that you’ve been wanting for a long time…”

 

Alphys’ claws were already beginning to sweat, and she rubbed them briskly against her lab coat before reaching down and picking up the box, not wanting to stain the parchment paper that Undyne had hand-dyed the day before. She presented the box to Frisk with a nervous flourish, and the human gave her a smile and a kiss on the snout before taking the box, making Alphys squeak and Sans snort.

  
“ Something I’ve always wanted, huh?” Frisk sat on a chair across from the table and couch and turned the package over in their hands. It was surprisingly light for its size, and the urge to shake it was almost overpowering. “ Was this your idea, Dr. G?”

**“ So-so.”** Gaster’s smile was one-half mysterious and one-half devious. **“ Sans and Alphys had already been working on this for several years, but they needed me to…’crack the code’, so to speak.”**

 

By now Alphys had scrambled back to her seat next to Gaster, and she and Sans both pulled out their phones to record the moment for the rest of their friends and family. Frisk gave a cheeky smile and wave to the red lights before turning their attention to the package in their lap.

 

“ So…should I just open this now?” They lightly fingered the tails of the box’s diaphanous bow before giving them a firm tug, the ribbon easily unraveling and slipping between their fingers as it fell down the sides and across their thighs. “ Or do you want me to wait?”

 

“ *go for it, kiddo. pap, undyne, and mtt would come, but they’re busy with responsibilities and stuff, unlike us; we just get paid to fuck around and cheat at checkers all day.”

 

Gaster side-eyed his son. **“ You’re just bitter because you lost to Alphys the last three times.”**

 

“ *those kingings were illegal and you know it.”

 

“ **For _human_ checkers. You know full well that ‘kinging’ in human checkers is ‘queening’ in Monster checkers.”**

 

“ *she never specified that we were playing by monster rules!”

 

“ H-hey! I did too! I wanted to play Go, but you didn’t want to because the s-stones would slip from between your bones, so I said we can play checkers if we do the complicated version!”

 

“ *that isn’t the same thing as saying we’re playing by monster rules, al.”

 

“ Sans, what other way of playing checkers has a t-twenty-member court system?!”

 

“ *if i wanted to worry about knights and angels and all that bullshit, i would’ve just played chess with you instead. not all of us memorize the hundred-page rulebooks of children’s board games, unlike _someone_ in this room.”

 

“ Says the s-skeleton that spent a whole day memorizing _Who’s On First_  when he s-should’ve been conducting those LHC fusions I’d asked him to do a day before!”

 

“ *you asked me to do it instead because you spent that whole morning downloading the _mew mew kissy cutie_ reboot’s second audio drama. i don’t think you have room to talk.”

 

**“ Children, for heaven’s sake--!”**

 

As Gaster tried to intervene between his two associates, Frisk simply rolled their eyes and went back to opening the package. After coiling the lovely ribbon around their hand, they set it on the coffee table and turned their attention to the paper, nullifying the magic tabs holding it to the box with ease. Undyne had obviously been working on her parchment-making technique, and as the human folded up the wrapping paper and set it next to the ribbon, they made a mental note to compliment her when they went back to the embassy.

 

Only the box was left, and after a moment of hesitation, the human removed the white lid and peered at the contents.

 

“…hey…” Frisk’s near-whisper snapped Sans and Alphys out of their ‘fight’, and the pair quickly scrambled to make sure their cameras were still trained on the scene, an action that made the eldest scientist roll his ‘eyes’. “ What is this? This is a prank, right? Don’t you guys know that I can’t …”

 

For a moment, Frisk couldn’t quite comprehend what they were seeing. They looked up at their friends and back down at the box, then back at their friends, and finally—

 

“ _Holy shit_!” It clicked, and their jaw dropped like a stone as the realization smacked them like one of Undyne’s ‘friendship tackles’. “ This is…this is…you…!”

 

Gaster grinned. **“ It’s exactly what you think it is, Frisk.”**

 

For a moment, Frisk could only stare at the senior scientist, eyes wide and welling with tears. Then, hesitantly, tentatively, they reached into the box and pulled out a pair a of familiar objects, cradling them in their upturned palms as if the slightest movement would shatter them to pieces.

 

A set of five, thin, flat metal rectangles on their right palm—all made of some silvery, amorphous metal that molded to the touch and hooked into a large metal ring that was large enough to slip around their wrist. At the top of each ‘key’ was a ‘window’ of a clear, opaque material similar to Plexiglas, each tinted bright red instead of the light blue they were used to. A larger ‘key’ on their left palm, with a larger of window of red inlaid in the triangular head, and a set of prongs on the pincer-like tail. Two rhythmically pulsing red lines ran from the window to the prongs, and to the uniformed human observer, the menacing appearance and undulating glow could easily be misconstrued as demonic.

 

Frisk, however, knew better. After all, they themself had used the spare Gaster Blasters--each stored in a rectangular key with a light-blue window—several times in the past, much to Sans’ and their body’s dismay. Sans had also showed them his now empty Master Key several times in the past; on one occasion, he’d even described the procedure in great detail, pantomiming exactly how he’d punched the prongs into his Soul and alluding to the brief agony he’d endured as the injected spell chewed its way through every particle of his body, his very SMP snapping apart, shifting, and sticking back together as the Gaster Blaster network was literally installed into his Soul.

 

Frisk had associated the Gaster Blasters with the light blue of Sans’ Soul for as long as they could remember, but the ones in their hands were a bright red—the same color of their own.

 

“ **I’ve nicknamed them Aegis Blasters; it’s shorter and a lot easier to say than ‘Gaster Blaster Prototype 004: Aegis Configuration’.”** Gaster had snapped twice before beginning to sign, breaking Frisk out of their thoughts and making them look up to actually see what he was saying. “ **Their abilities are slightly different from Sans’, Papyrus’, and my own, but the basic design and methods of manipulation are the same. I used your personal data to customize them based on your abilities and needs. Sans and Alphys had begun working on them several years ago, but seeing as I took the design of the Blasters to the Void with me, it took me coming back for the design to be finalized.”**

Frisk’s shoulders stiffened in surprise. “ What?! They…but they…” The ambassador looked between the other two scientists, completely flabbergasted. “ You…Al, you and Sans said that it was impossible…that there was no point in even attempting to create a compatible system…”

 

“ W-well, we…we didn’t want to get your hopes up.” Alphys mumbled shyly, leaning the camera against the empty box so she could wring her hands together. “ We were always working on it, b-but we both knew that it’d be a long shot, especially without blueprints or d-design records. S-sans wasn’t even there for the creation of the Blasters, so we didn’t have a lot to go on…”

 

“ *we still kept trying, though.” Sans quietly broke in. “ *hell, i’d been trying to recreate the design since dad fell; i ruined several spares by taking them apart to see if i could figure out how they worked. you being so interested in them just kinda renewed my own, but like al said, we didn’t wanna bring you up just to rip you down if we really couldn’t figure it out. fortunately, dad came back, sooooo…”

 

“ **Alphys and Sans did most of the hard work—I just had to show them how to assemble the basic structure.”** Gaster grinned and rubbed the top of his eldest son’s head with his free, non-signing hand, making him “hnn” in pleasure as he closed his eyes and leaned into the contact. If Sans had been a cat, his purring would have been heard from the ground floor. “ **Once we finalized the design, it was simply a matter of calibrating the system to your needs and syncing the magic to your Soul’s natural wavelength, which was a bit of a challenge, given the…’unique’ composition of your Soul.”**

Frisk blushed hotly. In their shared headspace, Asriel was skittering around like a jumping spider; ever since he and Frisk realized what was in the box, he’d been coming up with lists of possible attacks, and he kept insisting Frisk should ask Gaster if they find a way to make the Blasters perform “Star Blazing”. “ So…if Asriel ever needs to take control, he can use the Blasters, too?”

 

“ Hypothetically!” The nervousness in Alphys’ voice tripled upon the mention of Asriel, but a soothing smile from Frisk (and said child, who truly held no ill will against the dinosaur) set her somewhat at ease. “ B-but we won’t know for sure until we do some controlled tests! We _do_ know that it’ll be one-hundred percent synchronous with you, and we even calibrated it to adjust with your body as it starts to change from full human to part Monster, so you won’t have to worry about back s-s-splitting ever again!”

 

Frisk winced at the memory. “ Yeah, that would be a good thing.”

 

“ **Once you activate the Master Key, the Blasters will automatically calibrate with both your DNA and your SMP, so it will—sadly—be just as painful for you as it was for myself and my children.”** Gaster smiled sympathetically and took his hand off Sans’ head, much to the smaller skeleton’s displeasure. “ **Once the integration is complete, you’ll be loaded with six Blasters, just as we were. If all goes well, we can add more units to the system as time goes on. The mind/Soul link should tell you all you need to know about what your Blasters are capable of, but we’ll go over the finer details after the integration, of course.”**

“ Doc…Alphys…Sans…” The tears finally overflowed, and Frisk quickly set the keys on the table and lunged at the three scientists on the couch, embracing them as much as physically possible. Sans and Alphys clung back instinctively, and while Gaster had briefly destabilized from the shock, he soon recovered and wrapped his arms around the human. “ Thank you…thank you…I can’t…I can’t believe…”

 

“ *better believe it, frisko.” Sans patted the ambassador’s back soothingly. “ *besides, this’ll be good for me, too; i won’t have to worry about you as much when you go on your time-jumping adventures. you get firepower, i— _we_ —get peace of mind. it’s a win-win.”

 

Frisk pulled back and stared at Sans quizzically, resting on their knees in front of the trio. “ _We_?”

 

Alphys and Gaster glanced at each other, and it was silently decided that the dinosaur would speak first.

 

“ W-well…i-it’s not like we don’t have faith in you, Frisk…it’s just that you’ve been through a lot…what, with all the Resonance Kicks and the incident with the red Sans that tore your back open, and now you’re helping your other Gaster friend with his own Chara problem…it’s…well…y-yeah! O-o-of course we worry about you! We love you and we don’t want anything to happen to you!”

 

Frisk’s face contorted in guilt. “ Oh, Al…” The human gave Alphys another hug, and the Monster eagerly burrowed into their warmth with a sigh, relieved that they weren’t upset at or annoyed with her. “ I wish you’d said something sooner…I know that _Sans_ has been worried about me, but I didn’t know you and the others felt the same…”

 

“ W-well, we didn’t want to make you feel _guilty_ about time-jumping.” Alphys pulled away after a final squeeze and straightened her glasses. “ What you’re doing is so heroic a-and amazing and kind…it’s just so _you_. I-I guess we just hadn’t expected it to be so… _dangerous_. Undyne doesn’t worry about you too much, but I know Asgore’s talked to me about how anxious he is, a-and he asked if there was anything we could give you to make you safer…so here we are!”

 

Frisk snorted and shook their head. “ Yeah, I imagine knowing I have Blasters will make Dad feel a lot better…I’ll have to talk to him later tonight. For now…” Frisk stood, walked around the table, and picked up the Master Key and spare keys. “ Should I just…inject the Blasters in here, or should I go to the test chamber first?”

 

“ *the test chamber is probably the safest, just in case the blasters get a little _frisky_ on you.”

 

“ Jesus, Sans, _really_?”

 

“ *sorry, frisko, i couldn’t resist. come on, i’ll go on down with you; someone has to be there in case you pass out.”

 

* * *

 

“ Sans?”

 

“ *hmm?”

 

“ Do you really trust me with these?”

 

The skeleton glanced up at his human friend as they walked down the empty hallway to the test chamber. The key ring was looped on Frisk’s right wrist, and the soft magimetal clinked and jangled with every step. “ *heh, that’s an odd question kiddo…why _wouldn’t_ i trust you?”

 

“ You know exactly why.” Frisk sighed and clutched the Master Key tighter in their left hand. “ If these Blasters work, that means…well…if…if anything—“

 

“ *you mean if you suddenly go all tera on the timeline and i’m the only one left to stop you, i’m gonna have less of an advantage if you have blasters, too.”

 

“…yeah.”

 

Sans grabbed Frisk’s right hand, stopping them in their tracks.

 

“ *listen, frisk,” Sans’ gave the human’s hand a fierce shake, making the spare keys bounce up and clatter against his bony wrist. “ *there are three sentient beings that i trust completely: two of them are my bone and blood, and the third one is you.”

 

“ Sans…”

 

Another shake. “ *frisk, you need to start giving yourself a little credit. if you didn’t try to kill us when we were all trying to hurt you—for whatever reason or another—then you aren’t suddenly going to decide we all need to die _now_.”

 

Frisk swallowed and trained their shining eyes at their feet. “ I…I know. I just…it’s…”

 

“ *i know you’ve always been afraid of becoming like tera, that you still feel guilty for having to kill the pond scum that gave birth to you…kid, the fact that you get angry and want to hurt those that hurt others, and the fact that you’re willing to do anything to protect people…that doesn’t make you a genocidal killer.”

 

“ I’m supposed to be a savior.” Sans’ Soul clenched at the hoarse, lost tone of Frisk’s voice. “ I’m supposed to be a pacifist…to never raise a hand to hurt _anyone_ …that’s what people expect. That’s what they _want_.”

 

“ *you were willing to fight back against asgore and flowey when your life was really in danger and talking wouldn’t do any good, but in the end of it all, you spared them. do you remember what i said in the last corridor? the reason you didn’t gain any LOVE wasn’t because you were innocent or naïve, or that you were some sort of saint or the second coming of christ or whatever—it just meant that you kept tenderness in your heart. you knew when you had to fight and when you didn’t, and you took any option you could before you resorted to violence. you just…you always did the right thing. _that’s_ what matters, frisk.”

 

Frisk sniffled and rubbed their eyes with their left sleeve. “ You should be a motivational speaker. You’re not too bad at it.”

 

“ *nah, i like my day job.” Sans tugged on Frisk’s hand, and the two began to walk down the hallway again. “ *also, if you’re worried about gaining LOVE in your travels, just know that we aren’t gonna respect you less or love you less because of it. all of us trust you, frisk, and if the day ever comes when you have to kill someone, we’re gonna know that it was for the right reasons. like, we’re not going to be mad if you have to off a rapist or a mass-murderer trying to destroy the world.”

 

“ But Pap—“

 

“*—will love you no matter what. he has morals, but he’s not an _asshole_ , frisk. he may disapprove and worry about you, but he’ll make you the same spaghetti as he always does.”

 

Frisk seemed to mull over the idea for several moments before smiling weakly and nodding. “ Thank you, Sans. I’ll…I’ll remember that. Hopefully it won’t come to that, but if it does…I won’t forget.”

 

“ *that’s the spirit.” Sans winked playfully up at the human, making them snort and roll their eyes. “ *you sure you wanna go through with this? we don’t want you to have an identity crisis over this…”

 

“ Nah, I’ll be fine. Talking to you helped a lot.” Frisk gave Sans’ hand another squeeze and swung their arms lightly back and forth. “ You’re a pretty awesome friend, you know that?”

 

“ *eh, the gods know how much i’ve spilled my nonexistent guts to you over the years; the least i can do is let you do the same...and i always will, okay? remember that.”

 

It was the same thing he’d told them a thousand times before, yet it never failed to make warmth bubble up in Frisk’s belly, and the reply they gave was always genuine. “ I’ll remember, Sans. Always.”

 

* * *

 

“ Okay, Frisk, are you ready to go?”

 

The human in question, standing in the middle of the large testing chamber, glanced up at the source of the voice. Alphys was seated at the console in the observation booth near the ceiling, waving and nearly pressing her snout into the glass in her exuberance.

 

“ Yeah, I think I’m pretty solid on what I have to do…” Frisk glanced over at Sans, who was leaning against the wall and whistling. “ I just have to do what you did, right? Stick the prongs in my Soul and push the trigger?”

 

Sans nodded and gave Frisk a thumbs up. Above them, Gaster floated into the observation booth and took a seat next to Alphys, steepling his long, delicate hands and placing his fingertips to his ‘lips’. “ *yep, second verse, same as the first. it’s probably going to hurt like hell, but i’ll try to catch you before you faceplant into the ground if you pass out like pap did.”

 

“ Wow. Thanks, Sans. Truly I couldn’t do this without your presence.”

 

“ *don’t you humans have a saying about sarcasm being the lowest form of wit?” Sans grinned and glanced up at the two observing figures. “ *you good to go, dad?”

 

Gaster, of course, couldn’t answer them verbally, but his hands were still visible despite the height and distance. “ **Ready when you two are. If Frisk starts to have difficulties beyond what we experienced with the integration, you nullify the connection immediately, understood?”**

Frisk and Sans looked at each other and nodded. “ *gotcha, pops. okay, frisko, when you’re ready.”

 

Frisk nodded, tossed the ring of spare keys to Sans (who caught them with his telekinesis, of course), and gripped the hilt of the Master Key in both hands. One last look at Sans, Alphys, and Gaster—just to be safe—before the human brought the key up to their chest, inserted the prongs into the red Soul hovering over their left breast, and placed their thumbs over the red tab at the butt.

 

_Stay determined, Frisk._

With a steadying breath, Frisk pushed the trigger, and a torrent of magical data suspended in a red collusion of bioidentical DT shot out of the holding chamber, coursed down the three transfer lines, and plunged into the core of the human’s being.

 

The effect was instantaneous.

 

“ _Fuck!!”_

The Master Key clattered to the floor as Frisk fell to their knees, gripping their head and wrenching their eyes shut as a tidal wave of _everything_ crashed through their physical and ephemeral being. Every single nerve ending was burning and freezing and spiking, and their head felt like it was going to pop. Asriel was screaming, and the “sound” lapped with the blood suddenly boiling and overflowing in their brain, and with every lap the scream got louder, the blood ran hotter, and Frisk didn’t realize that they’d started screaming themself until their vocal cords began to ache with the strain.

 

_make it stop make it stop frisk make it stop i can’t it hurts i know make it stop we need this make it stop no it’ll be over soon i want my mom and dad i want them too make it stop it won’t hurt after this look at the skeletons but you’re a human think of it like a visit to the dentist it hurts trust me please trust me it hurts it hurts it hurts_

They were vomiting, and there was a bucket from nowhere, and Sans was holding their hair away from their face as bile and sweat dripped into the container below. His other hand was rubbing soothing circles on their back, and it was something to focus on, something concrete amidst the noise and the agony that wasn’t quite their own, and the lapping was beginning to slow, wasn’t it? Or were they just becoming numb to the stimuli?

 

“ Sans, are they okay?! Dr. Gaster’s on his way down…is Frisk--!”

 

“ *they’re doing fine, al. just like me when i got my own blasters. they’re getting over it as fast as i did, too, i think.” The hand on Frisk’s back briefly stilled. “ *is it running down, kid?”

 

It took several tries to get their voice to work, and when they did find their words, they were strangled and hoarse. “ I…I think so…it’s less hot in my head…Asriel’s calming down too, I think…”

 

“ *ah, shit.” Sans’ suddenly sounded guilty, and he released Frisk’s hair to grab a clean rag from his pocket. “ *we didn’t even think about if asriel was gonna feel it. his pain’s probably adding onto yours and making it worse.” He gently began to wipe the sweat, tears, and vomit off of Frisk’s face, and the human could hear the sliding doors to the chamber opening, signaling Gaster’s entrance. “ *i’m so sorry, frisk…”

 

“ It’s…” With the pain quickly fading into distant tingles and the pounding in their brain receding, Frisk suddenly realized they were kneeling in their own sweat. The vomit, fortunately, had been caught by the bucket in the nick of time. _How did he know? Do skeletons vomit?_ “ It’s fine. I didn’t think of it either, we’ll…” The click of high heels was fast approaching, and Frisk scrambled to stand, not wanting the doctor to worry too much about their condition. “ We’re doing okay…I…I think it’s gonna work…”

 

“ *easy there, kiddo.” Sans wrapped his arms around Frisk’s middle to help them to their feet, and Gaster’s hands were suddenly on their back and shoulders, steadying them. “ *how’s the prince?”

 

“ Better… " The pain had vanished almost as soon as it had come, leaving Frisk’s body aching, zinging, and surprisingly energized. Asriel’s shouts had soon faded to whimpers, and he had moved to a distant, dark corner of Frisk’s mindscape, figuratively curling into a little ball. Despite the minute-long unexpected hell he’d been put through, the prince was responding eagerly to the waves of comfort sent his way, and he did indicate that wasn’t too upset at either his host or the scientists for the oversight. _If Uncle Gaster didn’t see it coming, then no one could’ve seen it coming._

“ *well, at least the worst is over.” As soon as Sans was confident that Frisk could stand on their own, he released them and stepped back, though Gaster’s hands remained on their shoulders. “ *do you think you can do the thing, now?”

 

“ The _thing_? That’s eloquent.” Frisk snorted, wiped some residual sweat out of their eyes, and glanced down at their Soul to make sure it was in one piece (it was, though it seemed brighter than usual). “ I just think about it, right?”

 

“ Y-yes!” Alphys’ relieved voice crackled over the loudspeakers. “ I-if the data transfer worked well, the instructions and design specs should already be downloaded into your brain, so it’s just a matter of finding the Blasters and calling them out!”

 

Frisk nodded, closed their eyes, and breathed.

 

Despite being nearly debilitated by the integration, Asriel was far more familiar with the nooks and crannies of Frisk’s mind than said human, so the moment Alphys stopped talking, he gave them a mental nudge and brought them directly to the thought in question. In less than a second, Frisk went from _not knowing_ to _knowing,_ and the pent up energy at the bottom of their stomach seemed to spread through their arms and pool at their fingertips.

 

“ *…huh. you were almost as fast as pap. not quite, but almost. take a look, kiddo.”

 

Frisk’s eyes snapped open, and _there they were._ All six Gaster Blasters ( _Aegis Blasters_ , Asriel gently corrected) were floating in front of their master, snorting red smoke and gazing upon the three figures with their empty eye sockets, which would surely fill with the same crimson when activated. Outside of the color, they looked exactly the same as the skelefamily’s Blasters, and it made the human feel…loved? Connected? Safe?

 

Frisk mentally directed the Blasters to turn left. They did. The human sent another command, and all six heads circled around themself, Sans, and Gaster protectively. Another command, and one of the heads picked up Gaster by the collar and began to float him around the room, an action that had him wriggling, squealing, and laughing in his mangled, static-filled voice. Sans grinned, and Frisk gently lowered the doctor to the ground before ordering the six heads to disperse, which they did in a flash of white light. Their energy returned to Frisk’s body and coalesced in the area beneath Frisk’s OuterSoul, and when the human placed their hand to their heart, they could feel seven beats overlapping into one.

 

“ **Well, Frisk?”** Gaster’s smile was threatening to crack his face. “ **Are they satisfactory?”**

Frisk was silent for a long, long, time. Finally, when Gaster, Sans, and Alphys began to worry that something was seriously wrong, they began to laugh. Quietly, at first, and then the giggles escalated into laughter, and eventually the human was nearly doubled over in mirth. They spun around, tears of joy streaming down their face and red eye blazing like a sun, and startled both Gaster and Sans by pulling the pair into their arms off the ground. Both skeletons were lighter than most human children, and Frisk was strong and sturdy in spite of their slimness, and soon they were spinning the pair around and around the room. They were laughing, and soon Sans’ heavy, booming laugh and Gaster’s strangled, feathery one mingled with Frisk’s, and Alphys began to laugh over the intercom, and her buzzing and trilling seemed to harmonize perfectly with the other three.

 

Around and around the room they went, and Frisk was still crying, and Gaster and Sans were far lighter than the weight of the kingdom, and Alphys was surely calling the rest of their friends to tell them the news, and with the laughter and their ears and Asriel’s wonder in their head, it felt like…

 

Well, it felt better than determination.

 

It felt like love.


End file.
